Our Lot on the Silver Platter
by BlackFoxGun
Summary: "I waited a minute, silently staring at their bodies, before I slowly opened the car door, half expecting the man who murdered my parents to come back and do the same to me." There is genderbending in here, as well as murder, and future MATURE scenes. If you don't want to read anything like this, then please bugger off. For everyone else, please enjoy! Sesshomaru/Rin pairing
1. Chapter 1

_Hey, it's BlackFoxGun here __with now another story! I've been working on this for the past couple years, and finally decided to start putting it out for all of you to read! So here you go, and I hope that you all enjoy it!_

**XXX**

My story begins when I was eleven years old...

"Rin! Can you come help me carry some of these boxes in the basement?" My feet thundered down the wooden steps from upstairs, jumping the last three steps and landing with a loud smack on the recently polished floor.

I yelled,"Coming Mom!" then turned right and slowed a little, further opening the basement door, and hopping down the cement stairs, descending into the cooler air. The one earbud not in my ear swung wildly until I steadied it with one hand, my iPod stuffed into my back pocket.

My mother looked up at my footsteps and quickly pointed to several brightly colored boxes with a smile and resumed to stuffing a stubborn pillow back into its case. I reached for the one on top, a vivid magenta, the least bright of the three.

I hoisted it up and carried it to the main floor. They weren't that heavy, only about thirty to forty pounds each, so I was able to get them all up there pretty fast. Father was having his break from cleaning, so he was munching on one of those huge tubs of Red Vines while watching me.

When I had finished, he quietly murmured to himself "I knew she was supposed to have been born a boy, just look at that strength! It would have been much better for me too, it would make everything easier…" he wandered off, still muttering whatever he hadn't said yet about her being born a girl that day while waving a half eaten vine. I always heard him, but he didn't know that, and I pretended I hadn't.

Always doing as he said in hopes of gaining his much wanted approval, but it never happened, and I finally knew why. Because I was a girl, a female, a person unable of carrying on the family name. Mother always told me that he always had a hard time expressing affection, even to her sometimes.

I never really believed that after the age of five, when I had come to understand many things more thoroughly by making daily visits to the public library and chatting with my friends at archery practice, well, more like listening in on the older kids talking, because I didn't have any friends there.

They always acted nice to me when I was around, and they babied me, because I was a little kid. But when they thought I wasn't around, then they talked seriously, laughing and joking and loudly whispering about inappropriate things.

Right now was cleaning week, every spring, we cleaned the entire house for a week, and on the last day when we finish, we all go out to eat at a fancy restaurant. After we finished cleaning the dusty basement, then we would be done.

I started my last task, which was to take everything out of the neon boxes I brought up and decide if we need them or not, and if we did, then I would put them back in the box after dusting/wiping them off, if not, then I recycled them or threw them away.

By the time I was done, I had a dirty rag and cold hands from holding the wet rag. I put the rag in the laundry bin and went to wash my hands with hot water. I walked into the kitchen and rinsed my small hands in the stainless steel sink, washing my hands with my favorite soap, the watermelon scented one.

"Rin!" My fathers gruff voice called. "What!" I yelled back. "Its time to go out for dinner sweetie!" My mom replied from the front hall. I quickly wiped my hands on my purple jeans and ran to the front hall, snagging my sneakers from by the fish tank and stuffing my feet in them, then retying the black laces that contrasted well with the sparkly light blue and slightly dirty white.

I jogged over to mom and took the gray jacket that she handed to me, the one with the fur around the edges of the hood and nothing else on it. We all went outside to the car, dad in the lead and me taking up the rear, after we all were in and buckled securely, then dad took off and we reached my favorite chinese restaurant The New Garden within minutes.

I swung out excitedly using the handle above the door on the inside and skipped happily over to the entrance, where I help the heavy door open for my parents, who walked up to the front desk. Then mom said, "Table for three please."

A waitress led us through a short hallway to a room filled with tables. Then she sat us down at a table right next to the window, which happened to be my favorite spot, because in a small secluded area behind the restaurant, there was a small waterfall, with a cherry blossom tree and some other flower trees that I didn't know the names of, and a small pond as well.

I already knew what I wanted from the menu, "Mom, can I have pork fried rice and egg rolls?" She looked up from her menu and nodded,

"Sure honey, whatever you want, and you can have a root beer too if you want." I smiled and nodded vigorously, my jet black hair bouncing up and down with each nod over my yellow t-shirt, and my signature small pig tail sticking out of the left side of my head, near the top.

The waitress came to take our order, so I said mine before mom and dads, because I was ready first."Egg rolls, pork fried rice and a root beer please." The blonde haired waitress smiled and jotted that down on her pad. "I'll have the squid soup and water."

My dad said, handing the woman our menus, mom then ordered pot stickers and sweet and sour chicken with a coke. The lady wrote all our orders on her very white pad and then departed for the kitchen, telling us that our food would be with us shortly.

While we waited, my parents talked among themselves and I thought about what my life would be like if I had been born a boy, then when I got really old, I would have this long scraggly beard and a walking cane to whack people with. I giggled, covering my mouth so as to not disturb the other customers, then continuing to think of all the funny things that could happen if I was born male until my food came.

I opened my chopsticks and gobbled up my egg rolls first, then the rice, drinking the root beer in-between every couple of bites. When I had finally finished, I had only to wait a couple minutes before mother and father finished their meal, then they thanked the owners, who we knew very well because we came here often, and left the building.

We drove home in silence, except for mother commenting on how cold it had gotten outside when she opened the window. When we pulled into the driveway, there was a stack of tires blocking our way. Dad cursed quietly and got out of the car, mom also got out to help him move the tires.

Then suddenly, a man appeared with a gun, yelling something that I couldn't decipher, and he shot dad, who had charged him, and then mom, who was trying to run.

Then he ran from one to the other, taking all the valuables and their wallets off of them, then fleeing from the scene of the crime as quickly as he had come. I just sat there, so shocked that I hadn't even realized that tears were coursing down my cheeks and running down my neck and chest.

"Get up." I whispered. "You weren't supposed to die yet, both of you were supposed to live until you got very old, and only then were you supposed to die!"

My whispering became hoarse, and my voice dwindled down. I waited a minute, silently staring at their bodies, before I slowly opened the car door, half expecting the man who murdered my parents to come back and do the same to me, and then rid me of my valuables as well.

Then I hesitantly put my feet on the cement of my driveway, feeling as though if I made a sound, the man would be there, holding the gun to the back of my head, and pulling the trigger.

I let go of the door handle and ran to my mom, suddenly not caring about the man anymore, then crouching down and cradling her head in my lap, my tears falling on her face.

I wished that my tears would be like in one of the fairy tales mom had watched with me before bed, like how Rapunzel healed Eugean with her hair when he cut his hand on a rock. I decided to try singing that song that the lost princess in Tangled had sung, I was that desperate.

So I sang quietly, sobbing at the same time, and covering my mother's face with tears. "Flower gleam and glow… let your power shine… make the clock reverse… bring back what once was mine… heal what has been hurt… change the fate's design… save what has been lost… bring back what once was mine… what once was mine."

No miracle happened, no glowing hair or tears, no mom there to hug me, telling me that it would be all right now. I clutched her face to my chest, rocking, and trying to choke back the flood of tears that was overwhelming me, until I finally got a hold of myself and stopped crying.

Then I took off my jacket and put it under her head for a pillow, so at least she would be comfortable on her way to heaven, to her judgment. Then I slowly walked over to my father, who's blood was pooling around him and oozing down the driveway.

I walked over the little rivulets of shining red up to his dead body, then kneeling down and cupping his cooling cheek in my already bloodied hand. "For you father," I whispered. "I will become what you have always wished me to be, a son.

Because then I can at least do something other than mourning, and I can try to live up to your expectations of me, and then I can finally make you smile. Ok, father?" I smiled shakily and stood up, my hand slowly leaving his face, then I went inside the foreboding house, no emotion on my face, using the key under the potted plant to get in.

**XXX**

_I do not own Inuyasha or Tangled, but I sure as hell own everything else in the story, because it's MINE and it's totally AWESOME! Thanks for reading, and as always, if there are any errors in grammar, spelling, or anything else that is troublesome, then please let me know how I'm doing!_

_Until next time, _

_BlackFoxGun_


	2. Chapter 2

_**BlackFoxGun here! This is the second chapter, and I am realizing that the paragraphs and spacing are so screwed up! I also haven't known how to work with dialogue for the past years, so I will fix everything once I go back through it all, but for now please bear with me!**_

**XXX**

First I went to my late fathers room, went into the closet and found the box of clothes that he bought for me in secret, pretending that I was a boy, every year he did this, he got a new set of clothes for me, buying them as if I were a son, but he hid them, always keeping it from me and my mom.

But I had found them during this one time that he had asked me to get a shirt of his from his closet, and checked on them every year.

He had gotten this years clothes already, and he somehow got the sizes from mom. I took them out and brought them with me to the bathroom, changing into them slowly, reminding myself that there was no turning back from this.

The final step was my hair, I got my mothers hair cutting scissors and held up a lock of my hair, then closed my eyes as I cut it. Then I opened my eyes and quickly cut all the rest of my silky hair that I worked so hard to take care of, all of it falling gently on the rug I stood on, like snowflakes.

No, more like the blood that sprayed out of my parents bodies as they fell.

Finally, all my hair was short, and scruffy. I really did look like a boy now, lucky for me, my breasts hadn't started growing yet, so I didn't have to worry about that yet. I cleaned up after myself and padded to the kitchen, where the phone seemed to be waiting for me.

I picked it up and called the only person I could turn to now. I pressed the numbers, and waited. The phone rang three times before it was picked up. "Hello?"

I took a breath, " Hi grandma, its Rin, I need help." I let the breath out. " What is it sweetie?" I shut my eyes. "Mom and dad are dead," I heard her sharply intake.

"A man killed them, he shot them with a gun when we pulled in the driveway, when mom and dad got out to move some tires that blocked the garage door.

Then he took their money and valuables and ran, I was still in the car when it happened." "Rin, I am coming to get you right now, do not go out of the house, and do not call the police, wait until I get there. Do not turn the lights on. Wait for me."

My grandmother Kaede said in a very firm voice. "Ok, grandma." I said in a small voice. Then she hung up. I put the phone back on its charger and walked to the living room, where I waited for the next thirty minutes in the chair dad always used to sit in, counting the minutes as they passed on the digital clock next to the T.V.. 8:34, 8:39, 8:45, 8:51, 8:58, 9:00…

Then I heard a knocking on the door. I jumped up and ran to answer it, showing it to be my grandma, who engulfed me in a big hug. "Get a jacket," she said. "We're going now." I put on the one that was already tied around my waist and followed her to her Humvee, where she directed me to the front seat and told me to lay low for a bit until we got out of the city.

Then she pressed on the gas pedal and started out towards her house.

She didn't ask any questions of me, just drove as fast as she was allowed to in order to get to her house.

Finally we were out of the city and she told me to sit up, I pushed myself up so I was sitting properly on the seat, pausing for a second when I was done so that the rushing of blood to my head would stop sooner, and so that it would stop making my vision fuzzy.

I saw that were were on a gravel road, with trees all around us, and the moon was coming up, I could see it through the tree canopy and the separating clouds, it was a half moon tonight.

Everything up here always seemed peaceful, grandma lived up on a mountain, which we were in the middle of going up right now. After a few minutes of viewing trees, my grandmother's home came into sight.

She lives at an ancient shrine and also keeps a dojo that does archery, martial arts, and sword fighting, and she is the sensei. Her husband, and my grandfather passed away a few years ago, and he left everything of his to her, that including the military vehicle we were currently riding in.

We pulled up in front of the shrine and parked, then my grandma ushering me out of my seat and up the old cement steps, getting out her keys for the door and taking a few seconds to unlock it before letting me in the well taken care of old japanese style house.

Kaede locked the door behind us, took off her shoes as I did the same and showed me up to her room, also old japanese style. She pulled up and sat me down in a wicker chair, doing the same for herself as well. "Now Rin, tell me why are you dressed like that and why your hair is cut."

"Well," I said, sitting up straight and putting on a very serious face. "Father has always wanted me to be a son, he says that I should have been born a son just because of some of my masculine attributes.

And so, I myself decided that I would become a boy so that I can fulfill his wishes, and make him smile up wherever he is, at something I did, and so I can have something else to work on other than mourning, and to help me cope with the situation as well."

My grandmas currently stern face softened and she stood up, coming over to me and enveloping me in a big hug that was gentle and full of understanding. "I know how you feel, and so as of this moment, you are my grandson.

You will live with me and become a student at my dojo, and I will hire a tutor to homeschool you. Your name is now Ren." She let go of me and led me to my new room by one hand, our sock covered feet padding softly on the bamboo mats.

We just went up the hallway and took a left, then going all the way down this hallway and sliding open the door on the right. "This is your room now Ren, I will be off to bed now, I suggest that you do the same." I nodded and replied, "Good Night grandma."

She smiled, "Good Night Ren."

She slid the door shut and walked back to her room. I first noticed the small lantern that still glowed softly, providing enough light for me to see the whole room, hanging from a long slim hook on the wall.

The floor here was also covered with a large bamboo mat. In the corner, a light green futon was rolled up, with a white pillow on top, and on the other side of the room, there was a slide open closet.

I walked over to it and slowly slid it open, revealing multiple yukatas and a couple of mens kimonos on hangers, all of them being my size I found out, after trying several of each on and looking at myself in the mirror that was to the side, on the wall.

This must have been my fathers room when he was my age I realized, putting all the clothes back except for a dark blue yukata, which I kept on.

I put my own clothing on top of a shelf inside the walk-in closet, and came out, shutting the door behind me. I went over and rolled out the futon, putting the pillow at the top, then blew out the candle in the slightly swaying lantern, and tucked myself into bed, falling asleep as soon as my head touched the pillow.

I woke to the sound of birds chirping and the warmth of the suns rays streaming through the window to land on my bed, and sat up.

I ran a hand through my hair lazily, stopping suddenly when I realized that it was all short, about three inches long all over.

"Oh." I murmured, remembering the events of last night. I was at grandmas house, and I was now a boy, my name was Ren.

I pulled myself from the warm cavern of blanket that I had somehow managed to create in my sleep on top of the futon, and rolled onto the also warm floor. I stretched my legs out slowly, going into a left split, all the way to floor, then turning right into a middle one, then rotating again into a right one, all of them.

I put my right arm behind my head and pulled on it with the other, then doing the same with the left as I scooted my left leg by my right and stood up, swinging my arms at my sides in a carefree manner, then stopping and bending over quickly to touch my hands to the floor for ten seconds and swinging my head up gracefully.

I readjusted my yukata that I still had on from last night and picked up my still warm blanket off the futon and spread it back over it evenly, then taking the pillow and putting it to the side so I could roll up the bed, then placing the pillow at its rightful place at the top of the roll.

I stood up from my kneeling position and sighed, "Well what will happen next?"

I quietly questioned myself, then walking the couple of feet to the door, which I slid open and shut as I passed through, walking down the necessary halls to reach my destination in my socks, and finally walking onto the tiled floor of the kitchen.

Grandmother was already at the table, making rice balls, the ones that I always loved as a child. She looked up with a wrinkly smile and said, "Do you want to help me make breakfast?

As part of your training you are going to have to do this every morning from now on, and you better learn to wake up early too." I pulled up a chair and sat at the bamboo table, scooping up a handful of rice and molding it into a roundish triangle around the filling, some of the sticky grains staying on my slim fingers when I put the rice ball on the plate.

"Today I will walk you through your training schedule, the one that you will be doing from now on in the morning before or during breakfast, you will start with the lighter practice until you get comfortable with it, then I will move you up to the next level of morning preparation, the one that will then be your permanent routine in the mornings."

She continued, still rolling the balls of rice around a mixture of salmon and some seasonings. I placed the last ball on the last spot of the plate, taking the dishes to the sink as Kaede drizzled a mustard/paprika sauce over the tops of the rice peaks in slow, gentle, releasing of color over the snow white grains, dripping down the sides till it pooled at the bottom, where the plate stopped its venture.

She handed the rest of the dirty dishes to me to wash in the sink by hand, then walking out to the kitchen balcony with the breakfast in her hands and sitting on the railing, where I joined her when I was done with the dishes. She had already started munching on one of the little creations we just made, not caring that her hands still had seasonings and sauce on them.

I sat beside her on the wide patio railing, swinging my legs from side to side as I ate the rice off the top first, then delving into the tasty center with my tongue and eating that with a couple bite of rice for each little bit of salmon.

I started to reach for a second one from the plate in grandmas lap, but then she abruptly stood up on the railing, took off her socks and jumped off into the tree right below us, holding the plate of food above her head. "First," she yelled,

"you have to jump into this tree right here and climb down after you take you socks off!" I slowly stood up on the slightly wobbling board that posed as the top of the railing and watched as she disappeared from sight between the oak leaves, I hesitated for a split second after taking off my socks, then jumped, not knowing what would happen, but I should be fine, right?

Surprisingly enough, I landed on a very wide and flat branch, unharmed. I looked down and saw grandma waving at me from about fifteen feet below, on the ground, I looked at the branches around me and jumped onto the closest one, then leaping and free falling for a second before I grabbed onto a smooth branch about five feet off the ground and swing around it once, then letting go of it and landing on the ground, ninja style.

"Good, but that was only the first step in your morning training, now you just need to follow me and do what I do, if you don't hurry, then I will eat all of the onigiri and you wont get any and will have to wait till lunch to get something to eat, alright?"

I nodded vigorously and followed her as she ran into the forest, the two of us darting between trees and the shafts of light streaming from the tree tops, then coming upon a river and hopping from rock to rock upstream, then going to the bank and walking across the river on a big slippery log, then going back over it and using a hanging vine to swing back across.

Grandma was fast, and had apparently done this course before, taking every step with absolute certainty, while I was trying to keep up and not fall.

When we finished, the plate of onigiri was not empty, and so I got to eat a couple more, while sitting in the top of a tree.

It felt good, swinging my feet up in a tree over fifty feet off the ground and letting the wind flow between my toes and caressing the bottoms of my feet, both of which had grass stains, damp dirt, and a little mud on them.

I had stepped on a few rocks, they weren't pokey or sharp, but I was running, so I ended up landing on them pretty hard, so my feet got a little sore from that.

When we had finished the onigiri, Kaede showed me how to swing on a vine, without falling or whamming into something, and so we used that mode of transportation to get back to the house, right swing, left swing, grab a vine, grab a vine, land on the kitchen patio.

I loved it! I wanted to do it again and again until my arms got sore and my fingers cramped up, but I had other things to learn.

I followed grandma through the house to the dojo, where for the rest of the day she taught me the basics of archery, martial arts, and sword fighting.

By the time the sun had gone down and the moon came up, I was dead tired, I got to meet all of her students, and they welcomed and treated me like an equal, and I enjoyed working with them. In a way, I was glad that I had decided to become a boy.

**XXX**

_**Well, I hope that you enjoy this, and please don't mind the crazy stuff with the paragraphs, I promise I will get it fixed!**_

_**Until next time,**_

_**BlackFoxGun**_


	3. Chapter 3

**Here's another chapter for everyone! I hope that you all like it! **

**XXX**

* * *

I wasn't considered weak, or treated gingerly like glass, and everyone talked to me as if they had known me their whole lives, I was happy. The happiest I had felt in a long time. I fell asleep instantly, excited for the next day to come and hit me. Several weeks passed by and I grew stronger by the day, absorbing everything I learned and using it in training and in lessons.

My grandmother decided to home-school me herself instead of a tutor, so that I could get more work done and also so it could take my mind off the 'incident' and prepare me for when I revisited the sort of life that wasn't on the mountain, but with other people who weren't as accepting or kind as all the ones that I knew here. I switched to the regular training, this one taking a little longer and making me stand on my hands on a branch above rapids in the river, do flips above sharp rocks, and fence with vines.

Those being the easiest things in my new schedule. Eventually months passed, and then a year, I turned twelve, about a year since I had started living with my grandmother. Then another year passed by quickly, and then another, and then I was seventeen, and going to the high school in the city, where I met my first love, but it was like a crush, but the feelings were much much stronger, but, I had never spoken to him, not once. Who knew that the first time for doing that would be today?

I walked down the halls of my high school at a fast pace to the library, one of my most favorite places in the school, catching the shy glances of many girls as I walked by and smiling at them, making them all turn red each time, I smirked internally, thinking that many girls were swayed so easily, then again, it wasn't everyday that one of the few heartthrobs of Sakura High smiled at you directly.

I swung my bag over my shoulder and continued my way down the hall, turning left into the large room, two floors of rows and rows of books waiting to be opened and read, their pages stroked and spines held, yeeaahh, I am kinda obsessed with books, but I'm not the only hot guy in the school who loves the library.

I slid my gaze across the room as I walked to the isle I had left off on last time I was here and spotted the man I had crushed on since I first saw him, he was sitting in his usual spot, silver hair splayed across his shoulders and back, gold eyes moving back and forth while reading, his elegant hands holding the spine of his book gently and loosely, his grip tightening every once in a while when there was an exciting part, his eyes subtlety showing his eagerness as for what was going to happen next.

He sat at one of the tables scattered around the room in-between the shelves crammed with books, one of the ones away from where people usually sat. He liked to be away from the noise and the people, basically he wasn't a very sociable person, but he got great grades and made all the girls that went for the anti-social or stoic type swoon whenever they saw him.

I had actually never seen him speak to anyone except for the teachers, but even then I could never hear him. I walked over to the area I had left off on and reached for the next book to start on and sat down on one of the stools used to reach books that were up higher on the shelves, reading about Macbeth and his lust for power. Walking alongside him as he went to kill the king, kneeling beside him as he was declared the new monarch of that region, and falling with him when he died.

When I had finally finished the story, no one else was in the library except for the old lady at the checkout. I stood and quietly slid the book back in its place, next to Romeo and Juliet and As You Like It. I quietly wandered around to several other shelves, going farther into the library until I couldn't see the front counter anymore. I was currently in the action romance section, a place I had gone to often when I got a little weary of just plot lines and wanted to see some exciting action that had this unique suspense that I sometimes craved.

I spotted a paperback that looked good, so I reached up on my tippy toes to grasp the novel and pulled it down with no incident, then reading the back and placing it back where I had gotten it so I could come back to it. I knelt down so as to look at the books on the lower shelves and found none to be good hookers, so after about ten to fifteen minutes I got up from my crouched position on the carpeted floor and reached up for that one book I had looked at earlier, my fingers suddenly colliding with someone else's ivory colored ones.

I looked to my left and was surprised to see the man I had crushed on for three and a half years, Sesshomaru Nakamura.

"You can take it." I said, pulling out the book and handing it to him.

He took it, putting into his bag and said "Ren Hayashi, right?"

"Yeah." I said, not really believing that this was happening. Sesshomaru was talking, to someone other than a teacher, and it was me.

"Can you take something seriously?" He asked suddenly. I nodded in what I hoped was a serious manner, but really I was bouncing around like crazy inside, frantically wondering what he might say next. "Can I kiss you?"

My eyes widened and I managed to wrestle out a slightly surprised "Why?" before my throat seemed to block up and not let me say anything else.

"Because I've never kissed a boy." Now I was wondering if I was dreaming or not, so I bit my cheek. Slow motion, so that he wouldn't notice. It hurt. I didn't wake up in bed. I was still in the library. Thankfully my throat became unclogged just in time for me to reply to the silver haired hottie in front of me.

"Sure." I said, wondering if he was really going to do it. Then Sesshomaru reached forward with one hand and used it to hold the back of my neck gently and pulled me to him, using a couple of fingers from the same hand to support my head at the same time. He brought his lips to mine, the ones I had craved in my sleep sometimes, and I was sent into pure rapture.

The feel of those cool, satin lips against my warm ones was just too nice. He slid the tip of his tongue across my bottom lip, as if requesting access to my mouth, and I let him in, twirling his hot tongue with mine in a dance of the salsa. He wound his other arm around my waist and I had somehow entangled my fingers in his hair, tugging at his long, silky locks the way I had always wanted to, pulling him further into the kiss.

I moaned softly, slowly going into oblivion, the sweet oblivion, with this super hot god seeming man by my side, his well formed chest against mine. I slowly opened my eyes, which I had at some point closed, to see Sesshomaru's clouded with lust, probably the same as mine. I sucked softly on his bottom lip and bit it lightly, making him moan quietly. I smiled internally with success.

"The library will be closing in five minutes, anyone still in the library after that time will be suspended unless if with special permission, I repeat, the library will be closing in five minutes at four 'o clock. Please bring any books you wish to check out to the counter now as it will be closing in two minutes. If you are on a computer, then please log off now, if you don't, it will do so automatically." The lady at the front desk announced through the library speaker system.

Both Sesshomaru and I kind of snapped out of our make out session and let go of each other.

"Please don't tell anyone about this." He whispered, picking up his dropped book bag.

"Ok." I whispered back. "Wait a second, let me fix your hair, or some people might think something is up." He bowed his head so that I could rearrange some of the strands that strayed from his usually neat bangs and part. When I had finished that, he jogged off silently towards the front entrance of the library, leaving me to pick up my own bag and ruffle my hair before going a different course up to the front desk to give the library lady a bag of cookies that I had made today in home economics.

"Oh Ren, you are the sweetest young man I have ever met. Giving this old woman cookies that you made, you are such a gentleman." Mrs. Chindin remarked with adoration after I had given her the chocolate chip cookies.

"Thank you." I said, bowing and giving her one of my most brilliant smiles. Then I walked out of the library and pushed open one of the school doors and then exited the building, running to the bus stop for the city bus. I waited a few minutes before the bus came around the corner and stopped in front of me, the doors opening and letting me in. I walked to the back and sat down, taking out my homework and working on it until I finished it, then putting it back in my backpack and staring out the window, wondering what sort of things could have pushed Sesshomaru to do what he did back in the library.

My stop was the last one, leaving me to be the last one on the bus by the time I got off. I thanked the driver and got off the bus, then walking up the gravel driveway until he drove away. Then I ran into the trees on the edges of the driveway of sorts, finding the perfect trees that I discovered years ago, climbing up one and started jumping from one to the other, going up the mountain to my home.

"Grandma! I'm home!" I yelled, plopping my backpack by the door and taking off my shoes. I wandered into the kitchen, looking for a snack to eat. A plate was in the middle of the table, with grilled chicken kabobs on them, all laid out neatly and still hot, with a note on light blue paper right next to them saying 'You are free to eat.' I grinned, "Lemme guess grandma, did you watch Kung Fu Panda today?"

Suddenly grandma seemed to materialize right behind me and started to throw a roundhouse kick at me, but I stopped it with my wrist and blocked another attack from her with my arm, then targeting her midsection with a kick, but she blocked downwards and accidentally left herself open to be tripped, which I did and then pinned her down by sitting on her, gently mind you, and started to eat my afternoon snack.

"This is really good grandma, thanks for making it, want one?" My grandma chuckled and took the kabob that I held out to her, and tapping her other hand on the floor in the sign of surrender so that I would let her up. I stood up and pulled her up beside me using her empty hand.

"Yes I did, how did you know?" She said, walking out of the kitchen and in the direction of the dojo, leaving me to follow her with the plate of goodies.

"I watched that movie so many times when I was a little kid that I basically have it memorized, and thus the instant knowledge of all the lines." I replied, then continuing to chew on the chunks of chicken. We reached the doors of the dojo, which she pushed open easily to reveal five other students currently training on the three subjects that the dojo taught. Archery, sword fighting, and martial arts.

All of the pupils were male, because there wasn't any female that was strong willed enough to continue with our training every morning and day and get sweaty that had come here and tried out. Well, also the fact that no girls have even tried out for this at all. Jakotsu and Bankotsu were sword fighting, not with real swords at the moment, but bamboo ones. If those whacked you, then it stings a lot and leaves a large welt on your skin, so they are a good substitute.

Hakudoshi was working on the long range archery shooting, while running and jumping through trees, each target was sixty feet away. He hit the first three targets in the bulls-eye and the fourth in the first ring surrounding it, with the last five in the bulls-eye as well. Akago and Byakuya were training with each other, blocking and hitting, jumping and landing.

"Who wants chicken kabobs?" I yelled loudly.

"Me!" All the guys training shouted back, abandoning their training to run to the plate of yummy food that I held aloft with one hand.

I had already eaten two pieces, leaving eleven sticks on the plate, two for everyone else. Grandma quickly snatched her last kabob right before the guys reached the dish, all of them grabbing two and then hugging me, welcoming me home from school. They were like older brothers to me, and that's how I treated them. All of them were only a little older than me, about a year or half a year, so they were all out of high school, the one I was currently going to.

They spent most of their time here, at the dojo, hanging out with me, sensei, and each other. Jakotsu and Bankotsu are twins, and like to be very funny and outrageous, and love pranks, they are currently planning on making a haunted house, one scary enough to make a grown man pee his pants. They always love to scare people, I guess they got it from their parents, who are Hollywood famous actors.

Akago is an only child and his parents are often away on important business trips, so the dojo and everyone at it are very important to him, like his second home and family. He is shy in front of anyone he doesn't know, but very happy and bouncy in front of us.

Hakudoshi is part of a theater troupe, and has acted in some movies, all of which I have watched. He is a very good actor, many people pay a lot of money to see him. Sometimes he might ponder over something and end up being very quiet for a few days but otherwise he would be quite chatty and sometimes act out something funny he saw one time, making us all roll on the ground with laughter.

Byakuya is the oldest child of four, and the inheritor of a large and wealthy company that he will be taking over in a few years, but he is not all stuffy like some people might make him out to be. He is extremely gregarious and has told me that he has over two hundred friends on Facebook that he knows personally and has met face to face several times, surprising for someone like him right?

Me? I'm just a kid whose parents are away on vacation trips so much that they had me stay with my grandma and never visit me at all, just send me Christmas cards and birthday cards that all come about a week late.

I handed the plate to Kaede, thanking her again for it and ran to the storage room, grabbing my bow and arrows, then hoisting them over my shoulder and running to the hardest long distance archery shoot.

* * *

**I'm actually reading over this (which I haven't done in about a year) and laughing at parts that seem so ****awkward to me now that were totally fitting at the time. Do any of you guys notice any awkward parts too? If so, you should point them out to me, because it will be useful when I go back over all of my chapters and revise them. **

**Thank you all for reading this!**

**Until next time, **

**BlackFoxGun**


	4. Chapter 4

XXX

This one was a little out of the way because it is so large, and complicated. The shoot consisted of a huge amount of full grown man sized steel dummies in a large field, all of them close together and spaced out as well, like in a crowd.

There are twenty dummies that are bright red and made of the same stuff as our normal targets, we are supposed to hit each red dummy in each of the five targets it has on its body, but without hitting the steel dummies.

If we hit them, then the arrow breaks and cant be used. We can shoot from anywhere, just as long as we can get to it.

This course was the big challenger for all of us, and everyone had broken at least one or two arrows on this course.

I climbed up the naturally made stairs up to the top of one of the seven earth pillars, looking calmly over the edge to spot all of the bright targets and bringing out my bow, pulling my weapon from its bag, then slowly pulling the string taut against my cheek, holding the very end of my first arrow.

Breathe in, breathe out. Release the string.

It shot away from me, whistling as it soared through the air and made a soft thud as it hit the target, then quickly doing the same thing several more times, but swifter, moving my feet to position me at slightly different angles and spots.

Then I walked to my left, untying a light blue glider and securing my weapons on it before pushing away from the raised earth and into the sky above the 'crowd'.

I unsecured my bow and plucked out an arrow from my bag, adjusting to the awkward angle before pulling the string to my face and releasing it into the air to drop like a bomb onto the dead center of a target's head.

As soon as it hit, it quickly buried itself up to the feathers, like it was trying to hide from the world. That one was swiftly followed by many others as I maneuvered the glider to the other targets, taking three minutes more to completely hit all twenty red dummies.

It took another two minutes to get back to one of the pillars in order to land and put away the glider, retying it to a rope anchor.

Then I ran down the stairs, hopping over every other step and jumping the last four steps at the bottom, landing and doing a somersault using my shoulder to absorb the impact and quickly stand back up, slowing down form my previous speed so as not to ram into a steel dummy.

I collected my arrows, stealthily walking among the targets and twisting the heads of the arrows as I pulled them out of the targets, preserving the weapons so they could be used again.

Then surprisingly, I came upon a fox, a beautiful breed that I had never seen before, it had silvery white fur that looked incredibly soft, making me want to reach out and just stroke its back, tail, and ears for hours on end.

It looked like just a kit, it was so small. Apparently it had been left behind and had gotten caught on something, from the looks of it. It looked hungry, as if it had not eaten for a while, possibly a few days or so.

I bent down, putting my bow of to the side on the grass, and cautiously inched forward. The little kit's head suddenly snapped up and it growled softly at me, its eyes dull, and its stance weak.

Then it swayed slightly and fell over, shocking me and so I quickly came the last foot between me and the injured creature, picking it up and pulling the strong grass that had hooked itself around its paw, forcing it to stay in place, off.

I cupped its body gently in the palms of my hands, raising it to my face to inspect one side of it. The kit appeared to be fine, but his ribs kinda stuck out, and its fur was a little dusty, making me wonder if the time from his last meal had been much longer than I had originally thought.

Cradling it in one hand and part of my arm, I grabbed my bow with my free hand, the left one, and slowly stood up, then running swiftly, but in a way that didn't rock my precious cargo, slowing down when I came to the inner training grounds where everyone else was.

I carefully angled my body so that I blocked the fox from everyone's view, and so that it didn't look suspicious, walking quickly into my bedroom and laying it on top of my pillow, running back out and putting my bow and arrows back into the storage shed.

I went back to my room as fast as I could without arousing suspicions from Kaede or the others, closing my door behind me and almost running to the closet in order to change out of my current clothes.

I almost tore off my shirt in my haste, revealing my chest binder, which I grabbed the top of and pulled up a little, readjusting it. Then I grabbed a more casual T-shirt and threw it on over my chest binder, then pulling a thick winter scarf off a nearby hanger and used it to gingerly wrap the kit in.

I ran through the house, yelling out to my grandma, "I'm going out! I'll be back in a while, ok ?" I heard her respond that I better be back before dark from the bathroom, and I took off, jumping on my awesome motorcycle, a dark black with a very comfortable seat, and still holding the unconscious baby fox football style, I rode down the gravel hill that was my driveway.

I already knew where the nearest veterinarian was located, because when I was younger, much much younger, and when I visited my grandma, I always found at least one injured animal each time I came, and so each time Kaede took me to the place I was heading to now, so I had memorized the location.

It only took me a few minutes to get there, my short hair whipping frantically from the wind and slowing as I stopped in the gravel area, breathing out a sigh of relief as I saw the open sign on the door.

I carefully slid off my ride and readjusted the kit's position to make it more comfortable, before going inside the familiar place from years ago.

The door swung shut behind me, hitting the bell at the top of it once again, supposedly alerting whoever worked here now to my presence. Since nobody came, I called out, "Hello?" Then I heard the pounding of shoes on stairs from somewhere else in the building, then listening to them jog to where I was, impatient for whoever was coming to get here faster.

Then finally a door opened and a man came through it, about to say something it seemed, but then stopped, recognizing me and saying "Why are you here?" And I suddenly recognized him, Sesshomaru.

He had a volunteer tag over his shirt, swinging slightly from his fast coming to the current area, so I knew that my question had already been answered. "I have an injured fox kit here, can you help with with it?"

Sesshomaru's eyes turned to the small white bundle in my arms, which I brought forward and placed on the examination table, unwrapping the scarf, but keeping it beneath the kit, and let him examine it.

He touched it gently with his long slender fingers, receiving a small and very quiet whimper from it, and he got a stethoscope from a hook on the wall, gently pushing it up against the tiny chest of the creature, listening to its heartbeat.

"Well," He said, straightening up. "It looks like your little friend here is half starved, and needs some intensive treatment at the moment. He is going to have to stay here for a while, is that alright with you?"

I nodded slowly, "Can you update me on its health somehow? Or can I come here every afternoon?" I questioned him, wondering what he would say in response.

"I can update you when I can, and you are free to come here at any time, just as long as you are actually doing something here, otherwise it's called loitering."

I nodded, telling him that I would be coming here tomorrow to check up on the kit, and left, walking out the door back out into the crisp clean air, my heart pounding. I had not expected him to be there. I grabbed the handlebars of the motorcycle and slowly swung my right leg over the top and to the place for my foot on that side, then taking off quickly.

But I wasn't heading back to the house, I was going to an area I had found a while ago that was perfect for running, losing myself in it, forgetting everything, or giving me time to think.

Thud. Thud. Thud. The rhythm of my feet hitting the ground, over and over again. Keeping in perfect time with the hard hammering of my heart, pounding away at my ribcage as though it wanted to jump out and run somewhere, all on its own. I ran fast, the forest closing in around me as I ran, my motorcycle that was propped up against a tree getting farther and farther away with each step.

Eventually, I stopped. The light of sunset was filtering through the trees above me. I looked at my wrist, my watch telling me it was 7:56, and that meant that I had better start running back to my vehicle so that I could get home before dark, like my grandmother had told me to.

By the time I got back to my motorcycle, my heart was pounding in my ears. It was the only thing I could hear. Panting lightly, I swung a leg over the seat of the powerful vehicle, resting for a moment before twisting the key in the ignition and turning the motorcycle around to zoom out of the forest on my well worn path out to a deserted road filled with dusty gravel.

After a while, the thudding of my heart in my ears faded, replaced with the whistling of wind as I ripped past back roads, highways, and more sections of forest. Finally when the sun had just about finished setting, I rode up the long road that led to my home. My tires crackled as I parked the bike, getting off and walking to the front door, my skin warm in comparison to the cooling air around me.

Turning the knob on the door, I walked inside, taking off my shoes and looking at my watch, pressing the button to make it light up with blue. 8:39, around time for dinner. **Kaede should still be awake. **Stepping slowly, I headed in the direction of my room, slipping inside quietly and closing the door behind me before padding to the closet, and opening it.

I went to the back of the walk-in closet and grabbed a few things. Soap, and a fluffy white towel, then slid the closet closed. In the closet, there was another door covered with a curtain and hangers. I opened this door and stepped onto the bright green tile of my private bathroom.

Paintings of the mountains were on the wallpaper, and every surface reflected a small bit of light briefly when I flicked the light on. The black of the shower tiles stood out, matching the toilet, sink, and the rug. The shower was off to the side, nice and clean.

Beside that, a bathtub, and very nice deep one. The shower had a door of glass that was clouded. I locked the bathroom door behind me and stripped. The last two things that were coming off were my boxers and my chest binder. Taking off the binder, I breathed deeply, holding it for a few seconds before letting it out.

When everything was off and I was about to get into the shower, I stuffed my clothing into a basket that resided on one of many shelves that were built into the wall. I stepped into the shower, shutting the sliding opaque glass door behind me.

I turned the knob to turn on the water, tilting it so that it was in the warmish-hot area. As the water heated up, I pressed myself to the corner, having been sprinkled with the freezing cold drops of water, making my skin rise up in goosebumps.

Soon steam started to rise up from each surface the liquid hit, telling me to step in under the hot, wet, stream of water.

Droplets dotted themselves on my arms and shoulders, sliding down my breasts and falling onto the tiled floor of the shower. Grabbing the conditioner and opening the top, I flipped it over and squeezed a small amount onto my hand. I put the bottle back on the ledge and rubbed the substance onto both palms, then smoothing it through my short locks while I let the shower hit my back, closing my eyes as I felt it massage my taut muscles.

Showers were the only place I could let myself go, the only place where I could truly be myself, a girl. This is the one thing that I truly fear anyone finding out, me and grandma. But I think that there might be bigger things on her mind constantly, every once in a while I catch her thinking about something while sitting up in the branches of some tree around my training course early in the morning. She used to never let me catch her off guard. I worry about her.

Sighing, I lifter my head to let the hot water rush through my black hair and rinse out the moisturizing conditioner, running my fingers through my hair as it did so. I snagged a washcloth from a hook near my hand and held it to the rush of water, letting it get soaked. I used the dripping cloth to scrub at my face, getting off any dead skin cells.

I washed myself with a bar of soap and rinsed the small bubbles off with cold water. My body rose up in bumps at the temperature change of the water, urging me to get out of the shower. Turning off the water, I slid the door aside and reached to my right for the towel that I brought in earlier. Wrapping it around me, I roughly dried off my skin and ruffled my hair with the dry part of the white towel. I looked in the mirror, and I saw a girl, one with short black hair, deep brown eyes, and flushed pink cheeks.

I enfolded the towel around my body, imagining that it was an elegant dress and I was at a party. I smiled, pretending a man had just complimented me. In my fantasy, I looked up at the man, and saw long silver hair, gold eyes, and ebony skin. "No!" I said harshly, slamming my hand down beside the sink, ignoring the sting of pain on my palm.

The towel fell to the floor, circling my bare feet. I was glad that this room was soundproof. The steam drifting around in the air started to fade, the fan in the ceiling pulling it all out of the room, making a soft whirring noise. Bending down to pick up my towel, I whispered, "I can't." my voice trembling, my eyes wet and my breathing shaky.

Putting the towel down the laundry chute, I pulled my clothes from the basket I had them in earlier and tossed them down too, but I kept the chest binder. Gingerly opening the bathroom door, I slipped out, glad that my closet had a door, one that I had closed behind me earlier, and quickly grabbed a shirt, pants, and some boxers. Then I went back inside the hidden bathroom. I put on the boxers, then the pants.

Next I pulled the chest binder over my head, the material compressing my chest again. I put on the shirt, then re-ruffling my hair with my fingers and giving myself a once-over in the mirror. Grabbing my deodorant, I applied it to my armpits, closing my eyes and inhaling the familiar scent.

I put the bottle away and finished cleaning up whatever traces of me there were. Padding out, I snagged some socks and put them on before coming out of my closet and into my room. Humming a soft tune, I walked to the kitchen, finding Kaede on the back porch looking out at the stars. I lightly tapped her on the shoulder, awakening her from her thinking trance.

"Oh, you just got home?" She asked, a smile forming on her wrinkled face. "No, I did about a half hour ago, I just finished taking a shower. You ok?" I replied, a little worried. Her brow furrowed and she looked back out to the black sky dotted with stars. " I am thinking about your future Ren. I have always been here to guide you, so what will you do when I am gone? I am afraid for you. You don't know what dangers lurk out there in this world. I don't want to leave you out here alone, with nobody to depend on, no one to help you when you need it."

I hoisted myself up onto the banister next to her, leaning back slightly and feeling the wind brush across my face. "Grandma, are you sure that I cannot protect myself from these dangers? All these many years of training with you and the guys, why would this danger be something that I cannot protect myself from, or even run away from? Please, tell me."

She shifted her gaze back up to me, taking one of my hands in hers. "Ren, you are still but a child, yet you may have to carry a burden that is more than you can bear, I am sorry."

Then she looked out at the trees, blinking several times, seeming to try and push away the tears that had begun to stream down her weathered face. I was shocked, never in all my life had I seen her cry except for on grandpa's funeral, where she sat in a black ceremonial kimono. Sitting like a warrior of old times, tears silently falling, seen by her only grandchild, me.

During the ceremony, she sat stiffly up in the very front row. Not many attended the sad event. Only some very close family friends and the last few members of the family tree had come, each kneeling solemnly behind her on cushions, every face but mine and Kaede's wracked with tears, each person silent as they listened to the man up front who was telling the epic tale of the battle and the life of my grandfather.

My mother's hand held tightly onto mine, until the grip became too tight and I wriggled my fingers out of her grasp. Then I took my cushion and slid it up to the row in front of us, the one where only my grandmother sat, sitting next to her. I looked up at her face, many other people would have said that it was stony, but I saw different. When I looked, a saw a face full of pain and sorrow.

So I took her hand in mine and held it. Squeezing it for just a moment to let her know I was there, there for her. Then I too turned my eyes forward to rest on the coffin at the front of the room, behind the storyteller with his papers. When the man was done, he left, as did everyone else, including my parents, leaving me with Kaede.

A few minutes after everyone left, I turned back to her, and saw the tears on her cheeks. Then I hugged her, not caring if I crumpled the black fabric of her outfit. She hugged me back, seeming to clutch at me desperately, like I was the only thing she had left.

My reaction this time was the same as before, I just hugged her, this time tall enough to turn her face into my chest, her wrinkled hands clutching the front of my shirt. She sobbed quietly for a while, and when she finally pulled away, my shirt was wet and her eyes were still moist and foggy with tears.

"I am not going to be able to protect you, I am getting old, and the time when I join your grandfather is getting closer, I will only be able to tell you the dangers when you graduate high school, as is tradition." Her voice trembled, but she seemed to regain her resolve. I hesitated, before saying, "Do you want to practice with me? Maybe it will get your mind off of it, and besides, you haven't trained with me in a while, it will do us both good."

I smiled gently, my eyes watering, trying not to cry, trying to lift the spirits of the one who mattered to me the most. The only family I had left. "Alrighty then, we had better get started, or soon it will get too late to do such things." She said, the tears from earlier nowhere to be seen, instead, her eyes twinkled with mischief, the small grin on her face crinkling her smile lines oven more. And like so many times before, she jumped off the railing of the porch and landed in the tree, then running to the training grounds. I did the same, following her to the destination.

The moment that I came into the field, I put up my defense. Luckily, grandma attacked right after I did that, coming in with a kick to my midsection, which I avoided by dodging to the side and rolling, coming up behind her to deliver a punch. Kaede turned to face me and caught my fist, so I tried a different tactic.

I grabbed her wrist with my other hand and fell backwards to the ground pulling her on top of me, then using my feet to push her off and into the air behind me. I flipped up onto my feet, ducking a swift fist from her and then she tripped me, and I fell on my right side to the grass.

Then I swung my legs around quickly, knocking her off of her feet as I pushed myself up, going for her with my hands outstretched to shove her into the lake in front of me. I ran to one of the nearby storehouses to grab two practice swords. They were made of a heavy steel, but were sharp enough to nick the skin if you weren't careful.

I tossed one to Kaede, her clothes soaking wet and dripping on the ground from me forcing her to make a splash landing in the large lake. She raised her arm to catch it, droplets separating themselves from her sleeve to fly freely into the air with the upward motion.

I jumped high, coming down with the blade, which she blocked, then pushing me back and breaking the connection. After Kaede pushed me back, we clashed again and again, swinging our heavy swords relentlessly, grinning at the excitement of training together once again after so long.

We stopped our combat when we realized the time, because the sun had come back around the world, making dawn appear in a blaze of blues and oranges. I put our weapons away and cleaned up as my grandmother went to prepare breakfast for on this bright saturday morning.

When Kaede was younger, she traveled the world to experience the different cuisines because she was a chef, or at least that was what she aspired to be. To make food for people to make them happy, that was her dream. But then she met grandpa. She settled down and was never truly able to fulfill her dream, instead waiting for her husband to come home from the war. When he finally did, she was happy.

They lived the next ten years happily after he retired from warfare, but then he got throat cancer. He battled it with all of his strength for half a year, but he died in the end nonetheless. After that, Kaede opened a dojo. She taught every student all she knew from learning on her own and from what her husband taught her. And she still cooked, using all of her skills to make wonderfully tasteful dishes for herself, me, and the students at the dojo.

When I reached the kitchen, she was making a classic favorite of ours; Crepes. Crepes are basically french pancakes, she learned to make them when she visited France and worked in a shop for a while. When I was little and I visited grandma one time when she got back from one of her travels, she made me crepes.

Ever since then, they have been a favorite for the two of us. As Kaede finished up with cooking them all on a skillet, I got three plates from the cupboard. One for me, one for her, and one for the crepes. Then I snagged the toppings we would need: butter, bananas, and powdered sugar, along with a butter knife, a spoon, and two forks.

We decorated our crepes and dug in. When we had finished, I cleaned up everything and went to the living room to play video games. After an hour or two, my eyelids began to droop, so I turned off the T.V. and fell back onto the couch, falling asleep soon after I sunk into the cushions.

_Everything was in different shades of gray. I walked around, seeing a normal town, except for the fact that nobody was anywhere. It was like a ghost town in a film of black and white, but everything was in perfect order, nothing dusty, moldy, or broken. Looking at myself, I saw that I was the same as I was when I was six years old._

_I was the only color in this world. Just a splotch of color on a gray canvas. I kept walking down the middle of the gray road, not knowing where I was going. Until I found a park. That park had a playground, with swings, seesaws, a merry go round, a climbing structure with several slides, and monkey bars._

_Sitting on one of the swings was a boy with long hair, not in color like me, but gray like the rest of this place._ _He was swinging slowly, while staring at the ground and seeming to ponder something. I trotted across the gray bark chips silently until I was right next to the boy, who looked to be my age, and I plopped into the swing next to him, making the chains rattle and the seat squeak. _

_He looked up abruptly, his eyes wide with surprise."Who are you!? What are you doing here!?" I looked back at him in confusion. "What do you mean? This is __**my **__dream, meaning that __**I **__am the one who should be asking you those questions." The boy stared at me with and expression even more befuddled than mine. "I thought that this was __**my **__dream. So if this is both of our dreams, then would it be just __**our **__dream?"_

_The two of us pondered this possibility, strange as it was. I spoke first. "Yes, that seems to be how it would end up working." The boy got off his swing and stood in front of me, holding out his hand. "What." I said, not knowing the meaning of the action. He sighed. "It's called properly introducing yourself. You shake hands and tell each other your names. My name is Sesshomaru, what is yours?"_

_I stood up off the swing, shaking his hand before telling him my name with a smile. "I'm Rin."_


End file.
